1 Kings 3-6

1Later, Solomon formed an alliance with Pharaoh king of Egypt by marrying his daughter. Solomon brought her to the City of David until he had finished building his palace and the house of the LORD, as well as the wall around Jerusalem.

2The people, however, were still sacrificing on the high places because a house for the Name of the LORD had not yet been built.

3And Solomon loved the LORD and walked in the statutes of his father David, except that he sacrificed and burned incense on the high places.

4Now the king went to Gibeon to sacrifice there, for it was the great high place. Solomon offered a thousand burnt offerings on the altar there.

5One night at Gibeon the LORD appeared to Solomon in a dream, and God said, “Ask, and I will give it to you!”

6Solomon replied, “You have shown much loving devotion to Your servant, my father David, because he walked before You in faithfulness, righteousness, and uprightness of heart. And You have maintained this loving devotion by giving him a son to sit on his throne this very day.

7And now, O LORD my God, You have made Your servant king in my father David’s place. But I am only a little child, not knowing how to go out or come in.

8Your servant is here among the people You have chosen, a people too numerous to count or number.

9Therefore give Your servant an understanding heart to judge Your people and to discern between good and evil. For who is able to govern this great people of Yours?”

10Now it pleased the Lord that Solomon had made this request.

11So God said to him, “Since you have asked for this instead of requesting long life or wealth for yourself or death for your enemies—but you have asked for discernment to administer justice—

12behold, I will do what you have asked. I will give you a wise and discerning heart, so that there will never have been another like you, nor will there ever be.

13Moreover, I will give you what you did not request—both riches and honor—so that during all your days no man in any kingdom will be your equal.

14So if you walk in My ways and keep My statutes and commandments, just as your father David did, I will prolong your days.”

15Then Solomon awoke, and indeed it had been a dream. So he returned to Jerusalem, stood before the ark of the covenant of the Lord, and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings. Then he held a feast for all his servants.

16At that time two prostitutes came to the king and stood before him.

17One woman said, “Please, my lord, this woman and I live in the same house, and I gave birth while she was in the house.

18On the third day after I gave birth, this woman also had a baby. We were alone, with no one in the house but the two of us.

19During the night this woman’s son died because she rolled over on him.

20So she got up in the middle of the night and took my son from my side while I was asleep. She laid him in her bosom and put her dead son at my bosom.

21The next morning, when I got up to nurse my son, I discovered he was dead. But when I examined him, I realized that he was not the son I had borne.”

22“No,” said the other woman, “the living one is my son and the dead one is your son.” But the first woman insisted, “No, the dead one is yours and the living one is mine.” So they argued before the king.

23Then the king replied, “This woman says, ‘My son is alive and yours is dead,’ but that woman says, ‘No, your son is dead and mine is alive.’”

24The king continued, “Bring me a sword.” So they brought him a sword,

25and the king declared, “Cut the living child in two and give half to one and half to the other.”

26Then the woman whose son was alive spoke to the king because she yearned with compassion for her son. “Please, my lord,” she said, “give her the living baby. Do not kill him!” But the other woman said, “He will be neither mine nor yours. Cut him in two!”

27Then the king gave his ruling: “Give the living baby to the first woman. By no means should you kill him; she is his mother.”

28When all Israel heard of the judgment the king had given, they stood in awe of him, for they saw that the wisdom of God was in him to administer justice.

1So King Solomon ruled over Israel,

2and these were his chief officials: Azariah son of Zadok was the priest;

3Elihoreph and Ahijah, the sons of Shisha, were secretaries; Jehoshaphat son of Ahilud was the recorder;

4Benaiah son of Jehoiada was in charge of the army; Zadok and Abiathar were priests;

5Azariah son of Nathan was in charge of the governors; Zabud son of Nathan was a priest and adviser to the king;

6Ahishar was in charge of the palace; and Adoniram son of Abda was in charge of the forced labor.

7Solomon had twelve governors over all Israel to provide food for the king and his household. Each one would arrange provisions for one month of the year,

8and these were their names: Ben-hur in the hill country of Ephraim;

9Ben-deker in Makaz, in Shaalbim, in Beth-shemesh, and in Elon-beth-hanan;

10Ben-hesed in Arubboth (Socoh and all the land of Hepher belonged to him);

11Ben-abinadab in Naphath-dor (Taphath, a daughter of Solomon, was his wife);

12Baana son of Ahilud in Taanach, in Megiddo, and in all of Beth-shean next to Zarethan below Jezreel, from Beth-shean to Abel-meholah and on past Jokmeam;

13Ben-geber in Ramoth-gilead (the villages of Jair son of Manasseh in Gilead belonged to him, as well as the region of Argob in Bashan with its sixty great cities with walls and bronze bars);

14Ahinadab son of Iddo in Mahanaim;

15Ahimaaz in Naphtali (he had married Basemath, a daughter of Solomon);

16Baana son of Hushai in Asher and in Aloth;

17Jehoshaphat son of Paruah in Issachar;

18Shimei son of Ela in Benjamin;

19Geber son of Uri in the land of Gilead, including the territories of Sihon king of the Amorites and of Og king of Bashan. There was also one governor in the land of Judah.

20The people of Judah and Israel were as numerous as the sand on the seashore, and they were eating and drinking and rejoicing.

21And Solomon reigned over all the kingdoms from the Euphrates to the land of the Philistines, as far as the border of Egypt. These kingdoms offered tribute and served Solomon all the days of his life.

22Solomon’s provisions for a single day were thirty cors of fine flour, sixty cors of meal,

23ten fat oxen, twenty range oxen, and a hundred sheep, as well as deer, gazelles, roebucks, and fattened poultry.

24For Solomon had dominion over everything west of the Euphrates —over all the kingdoms from Tiphsah to Gaza—and he had peace on all sides.

25Throughout the days of Solomon, Judah and Israel dwelt securely from Dan to Beersheba, each man under his own vine and his own fig tree.

26Solomon had 4,000 stalls for his chariot horses and 12,000 horses.

27Each month the governors in turn provided food for King Solomon and all who came to his table. They saw to it that nothing was lacking.

28Each one also brought to the required place their quotas of barley and straw for the chariot horses and other horses.

29And God gave Solomon wisdom, exceedingly deep insight, and understanding beyond measure, like the sand on the seashore.

30Solomon’s wisdom was greater than that of all the men of the East, greater than all the wisdom of Egypt.

31He was wiser than all men—wiser than Ethan the Ezrahite, and wiser than Heman, Calcol, and Darda, the sons of Mahol. And his fame spread throughout the surrounding nations.

32Solomon composed three thousand proverbs, and his songs numbered a thousand and five.

33He spoke of trees, from the cedar in Lebanon to the hyssop growing in the wall, and he taught about animals, birds, reptiles, and fish.

34So men of all nations came to listen to Solomon’s wisdom, sent by all the kings of the earth, who had heard of his wisdom.

1Now when Hiram king of Tyre heard that Solomon had been anointed king in his father’s place, he sent envoys to Solomon; for Hiram had always been a friend of David.

2And Solomon relayed this message to Hiram:

3“As you are well aware, due to the wars waged on all sides against my father David, he could not build a house for the Name of the LORD his God until the LORD had put his enemies under his feet.

4But now the LORD my God has given me rest on every side, and there is no adversary or crisis.

5So behold, I plan to build a house for the Name of the LORD my God, according to what the LORD said to my father David: ‘I will put your son on your throne in your place, and he will build the house for My Name.’

6Now therefore, order that cedars of Lebanon be cut down for me. My servants will be with your servants, and I will pay your servants whatever wages you set, for you know that there are none among us as skilled in logging as the Sidonians.”

7When Hiram received Solomon’s message, he rejoiced greatly and said, “Blessed be the LORD this day! He has given David a wise son over this great people!”

8Then Hiram sent a reply to Solomon, saying: “I have received your message; I will do all you desire regarding the cedar and cypress timber.

9My servants will haul the logs from Lebanon to the Sea, and I will float them as rafts by sea to the place you specify. There I will separate the logs, and you can take them away. And in exchange, you can meet my needs by providing my household with food.”

10So Hiram provided Solomon with all the cedar and cypress timber he wanted,

11and year after year Solomon would provide Hiram with 20,000 cors of wheat as food for his household, as well as 20,000 baths of pure olive oil.

12And the LORD gave Solomon wisdom, as He had promised him. There was peace between Hiram and Solomon, and the two of them made a treaty.

13Then King Solomon conscripted a labor force of 30,000 men from all Israel.

14He sent them to Lebanon in monthly shifts of 10,000 men, so that they would spend one month in Lebanon and two months at home. And Adoniram was in charge of the forced labor.

15Solomon had 70,000 porters and 80,000 stonecutters in the mountains,

16not including his 3,300 foremen who supervised the workers.

17And the king commanded them to quarry large, costly stones to lay the foundation of the temple with dressed stones.

18So Solomon’s and Hiram’s builders, along with the Gebalites, quarried the stone and prepared the timber and stone for the construction of the temple.

1In the four hundred and eightieth year after the Israelites had come out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth year of Solomon’s reign over Israel, in the month of Ziv, the second month, he began to build the house of the LORD.

2The house that King Solomon built for the LORD was sixty cubits long, twenty cubits wide, and thirty cubits high.

3The portico at the front of the main hall of the temple was twenty cubits long, extending across the width of the temple and projecting out ten cubits in front of the temple.

4He also had narrow windows framed high in the temple.

5Against the walls of the temple and the inner sanctuary, Solomon built a chambered structure around the temple, in which he constructed the side rooms.

6The bottom floor was five cubits wide, the middle floor six cubits, and the third floor seven cubits. He also placed offset ledges around the outside of the temple, so that nothing would be inserted into its walls.

7The temple was constructed using finished stones cut at the quarry, so that no hammer or chisel or any other iron tool was heard in the temple while it was being built.

8The entrance to the bottom floor was on the south side of the temple. A stairway led up to the middle level, and from there to the third floor.

9So Solomon built the temple and finished it, roofing it with beams and planks of cedar.

10He built chambers all along the temple, each five cubits high and attached to the temple with beams of cedar.

11Then the word of the LORD came to Solomon, saying:

12“As for this temple you are building, if you walk in My statutes, carry out My ordinances, and keep all My commandments by walking in them, I will fulfill through you the promise I made to your father David.

13And I will dwell among the Israelites and will not abandon My people Israel.”

14So Solomon built the temple and finished it.

15He lined the interior walls with cedar paneling from the floor of the temple to the ceiling, and he covered the floor with cypress boards.

16He partitioned off the twenty cubits at the rear of the temple with cedar boards from floor to ceiling to form within the temple an inner sanctuary, the Most Holy Place.

17And the main hall in front of this room was forty cubits long.

18The cedar paneling inside the temple was carved with gourds and open flowers. Everything was cedar; not a stone could be seen.

19Solomon also prepared the inner sanctuary within the temple to set the ark of the covenant of the LORD there.

20The inner sanctuary was twenty cubits long, twenty cubits wide, and twenty cubits high. He overlaid the inside with pure gold, and he also overlaid the altar of cedar.

21So Solomon overlaid the inside of the temple with pure gold, and he extended gold chains across the front of the inner sanctuary, which was overlaid with gold.

22So he overlaid with gold the whole interior of the temple, until everything was completely finished. He also overlaid with gold the entire altar that belonged to the inner sanctuary.

23In the inner sanctuary he made two cherubim, each ten cubits high, out of olive wood.

24One wing of the first cherub was five cubits long, and the other wing was five cubits long as well. So the full wingspan was ten cubits.

25The second cherub also measured ten cubits; both cherubim had the same size and shape,

26and the height of each cherub was ten cubits.

27And he placed the cherubim inside the innermost room of the temple. Since their wings were spread out, the wing of the first cherub touched one wall, while the wing of the second cherub touched the other wall, and in the middle of the room their wingtips touched.

28He also overlaid the cherubim with gold.

29Then he carved the walls all around the temple, in both the inner and outer sanctuaries, with carved engravings of cherubim, palm trees, and open flowers.

30And he overlaid the temple floor with gold in both the inner and outer sanctuaries.

31For the entrance to the inner sanctuary, Solomon constructed doors of olive wood with five-sided doorposts.

32The double doors were made of olive wood, and he carved into them cherubim, palm trees, and open flowers and overlaid the cherubim and palm trees with hammered gold.

33In the same way he made four-sided doorposts of olive wood for the sanctuary entrance.

34The two doors were made of cypress wood, and each had two folding panels.

35He carved into them cherubim, palm trees, and open flowers, and he overlaid them with gold hammered evenly over the carvings.

36Solomon built the inner courtyard with three rows of dressed stone and one row of trimmed cedar beams.

37The foundation of the house of the LORD was laid in the fourth year of Solomon’s reign, in the month of Ziv.

38In the eleventh year, in the month of Bul, the eighth month, the temple was finished in every detail and according to every specification. So he built the temple in seven years.